DAC Collection Artist Information

Walker Evans
American (1903 - 1975)

American photographer

Brief biography, in most instances from the Union List of Artist Names® Online:
Born 3 November 1903; died 10 April 1975. In 1928 Evans worked as a freelance photographer in Boston, Massachusetts and New York City, New York. In 1930 Evans undertook a project to photograph popular housing and Victorian architecture in New England. In 1935 Evans travelled to New Orleans, Louisiana to photograph southern plantation architecture. From 1935 to 1937 Evans worked as a staff photographer for the Farm Security Administration. In 1935 he documented the coal mines and industrial towns in Pennsylvania and West Virginia as well as the effects of flooding in Arkansas and Tennessee in 1936-1937. In 1937 Evans undertook a project with James Agee to photograph the lives of tenent farm families in Hale County, Alabama. The project was turned into a book entitled "Let Us Now Praise Famous Men". In 1943 Evans joined the staff of Time Magazine. From 1945 to 1965 Evans acted as editor and photographer for Fortune Magazine. During the 1950s Evans began to focus on American industrial landscapes.

Artist ID number in the Union List of Artist Names®:ULAN 500012076.The ULAN link above leads to a cataloging authority record at the Getty Research Institute.

Information here was last updated on 12/6/2018. Some is from older cataloging. Most objects acquired through 12/6/2018 are represented; cataloging is in process for some objects. We continue to add and update content. Please contact the DAC Registrar of Collections to suggest corrections with citations. Captions embedded in DAC images have basic information as of the time the digital image was made; details and updates appear on object pages.